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the fish’s body jerked in a horrible death dance.
    It was then that she screamed, “How could you do that, Granpa? How could you?”
    “Janey, it’s the only way. You need to kill it quickly. You don’t want to eat him alive, do you?”
    “You love fish,” Augusta reminded her. “And not just trout. Salmon, tuna—”
    “This is different!” Jane covered her ears and shook her head back and forth. Words felt far away and hard to get to. “It’s different when you
knew
him, when you knew where he lived and his family—what if he was on his way home to his family!” Waves of sadness were crashing in her ears, over her head. She ripped off the sunglasses and threw them into the lake.
    Augusta stifled a small laugh. “Oh, now, that was just silly.”
    But she also took the fish from Granpa, who then took Jane’s hand. “Let’s go for a walk.”
    On the walk, Granpa explained that a swift, stunning blow was the best kind of death for a fish out of water. “Because you shouldn’t keep it suffering,” Granpa explained. “That would be cruel.”
    Jane tried to be comforted. She collected some pinecones. She let Granpa wipe her tears with his yellow handkerchief.
    When they got back to camp, Augusta had gutted and grilled the trout, serving it up with lemon. “Now, then,” she coaxed. “Try a bite.”
    And Jane tried to forget that the fish in her stomach was the same as the fish in the net.
    Late that night, the bad feelings came back. She imagined the pieces of chewed-up fish in the bottom of her stomach. Unchewing, reattaching, reforming. The fish hiccupped inside her. It wanted to leave to go back to the lake.She had tried to block out the bad thought by imagining that she was lying under a tree at Orchard Way and feeling the sunshine on her skin, the way Dr. Beigeleisen had taught her.
    Jane hunched her shoulders up to her ears. Flattened a hand to her stomach. She listened to her grandparents’ breathing. Augusta on one side and Granpa on the other, and Jane in the middle, protected on both sides from bears. Both of her grandparents were sound asleep.
    But she knew that she had to put the fish in the water. When she couldn’t stand another minute, she crawled from the tent. On her hands and knees, then barefoot in the slimy, wet mud. Moving to the shore as if she were being pulled forward in an undertow.
    When she kneeled down beside the lake, she could feel the fish wriggling in her throat. She leaned forward, gagging. A sour, vomity taste closed up the back of her throat.
    The pain shocked her. Granpa’s large hands gripped too tightly. “Janey! There you are!” His fingers hooked strong underneath Jane’s armpits, ripping her from her trance as he yanked her roughly up. Her feet caught air as Granpa swung her high. He shook her so hard, she felt blood slosh under her skin.
    “What are you doing so close to the water? If you’re feeling sick, you wake us up! You know better than this! Are you out of your goddamn mind?”
    Jane had never heard her grandfather curse. It was likebeing stuck by pins. She burst into fresh tears. Then Augusta was there, her gray hair spilled loose around her shoulders, like a sweet witch, shushing her. But Augusta’s heart was beating fast when she pulled Jane close, and Jane wrenched herself away.
    They left the lake a little later that night. Jane pitched a fit all the way back. She tried to explain about the fish. How it spoke to her. How she had to put him back in the lake. Up in the front seat came nothing but worried silence. But the echo of Granpa’s words stayed in Jane’s ears.
Are you out of your goddamn mind?
    The next week, her parents took her to Dr. Fox, who worked all the way in Providence. Dr. Fox’s office was more solemn than Dr. Beigeleisen’s. Whereas Dr. B’s office was like an art room where Jane drew pictures and solved puzzles, Dr. Fox’s office was like the president’s. The carpet and the drapes were so thick that they closed off